


Work in Progress

by Ketlingr



Series: Adoptionverse [1]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Autism, Autistic Tony Stark, Disabilities, Gen, Kid Fic, anger issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 13:25:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10945407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ketlingr/pseuds/Ketlingr
Summary: Tony Stark is an autistic kid. Edwin Jarvis keeps bringing more kids to Stark Manor so Tony can work on his social skills and have some friends. All of the others have their own issues to deal with, too, and they all learn to support each other.





	Work in Progress

He could not find the room Natasha had told him about. The one with the skeletons. Tony guessed he wasn't supposed to look for it, much less find it - rooms with skeletons didn't sound like something anyone was supposed to find. Certainly not someone his age. He wasn't even allowed to see movies with skeletons. 

But he was curious about it. And it was exciting. Made his heart beat faster, he could feel it. That was good. 

After his third round through the entire estate, Tony still hadn’t found the right room, though. It was a large place, chances were he had just missed it. And of course there were areas he wasn’t supposed to go, his father’s labs and study and bedroom, and people’s private rooms. How was he supposed to find a goddamn closet if he wasn’t allowed into people’s private rooms? The only actual closets he had been able to check had been his own - naturally Tony wouldn’t assume that just because he knew his closet it couldn’t be a good hiding place, that’s what the bad guys counted on, for people to be so naive - and Bruce’s and Groot’s. Bruce was his best friend, and he liked Tony to check his room, because he was scared so easily. And Groot was a kid, he didn’t even know people weren’t allowed in his room unless he said so. Of course he wouldn’t mind. 

It had been a few hours by now, although Tony couldn’t be sure how long exactly, and he was starting to feel a little tired. He had missed lunch, definitely, and possibly also dinner. Jarvis would be mad, he wasn’t supposed to miss more than one meal a day. None, if he could manage, but Tony rarely did. He wasn’t going to give up now, though, not when he could feel he was so close to finding that room. Of course he had considered that Natasha had perhaps meant a piece of furniture, but there were no furniture-type closets in the entire estate, they all had walk-in closets, and even most of the shelves were let into the walls. Tony’s dad said it looked modern. Tony thought it only made this whole task more difficult. 

As it was quiet enough to assume nobody was around, Tony decided to sneak into some of the others’ rooms. He was halfway through Drax’s bedroom when the door behind him flew open. 

“Shit,” was all Tony managed to say before a yelling Drax was in his face, punching his shoulder hard enough to send Tony to the floor. It really hurt, but Tony didn’t mind a lot - his heart was racing. “You’re not supposed to hit people,” he said as calmly as he managed. 

“You’re in my room!” Drax yelled back. And Tony felt bad, because now Jarvis was going to be mad at him twice as much. ‘There are good reasons you’re not supposed to go into people’s rooms, Tony.’ He could hear him in his head. Another punch reminded Tony that now was not the time to dear Jarvis. Drax was frustrated and still yelling at him to get out and Tony knew that if he lost control they’d both get into even more trouble. And Drax had worked hard not to lose control so often, Tony didn’t want to be the one to ruin that. 

“I just wanted to look at your closet, relax,” he said and got up, carefully circling the angry boy with his hands raised, palms out. “I’m leaving, alright?” By the time he was in the hallway again, Tony’s shoulder was throbbing. He sighed, already hearing Jarvis’ hurrying towards the source of the yelling. If the frown on his face meant anything, Tony guessed Jarvis was concerned. Or angry. Or both. 

“What did you do, Tony?” Jarvis sighed when he stopped an arm’s length away from the boy. 

“I went into his room. Now, before you get mad, I didn’t take anything, I just wanted to look at his closet, it was very-”

“Tony, we talked about this.” Another sigh. Tony hated sighs. “Did he hurt you?” Shaking his head, Tony avoided touching his arm or shoulder. “You missed lunch and dinner, Tony. I don’t know what you were up to, but if you keep this up I’ll have to team you up again.” 

“I’ll be good. I promise.” Just no teams, please. Not again.

 

* * *

 

 

Two days later, Tony had been teamed up with Bruce. Admittedly, it could have been worse. They got along; Bruce wasn’t as slow as some of the others, and Tony felt important watching out for his friend. He’d heard his father say once that Bruce was worse than Drax, but Tony didn’t think so. Yeah, when Bruce did have a meltdown he was pretty scary, but when he didn’t he was really nice. Drax was always mean, and more so when he was upset. 

“It’s not his fault,” Jarvis had explained the first time Drax had punched Tony. “He gets very frustrated and he’s not good at using his words, Tony.” Sometimes Tony thought it really wasn’t fair, but then he had thought about how sad Bruce was after his meltdowns, and how sorry he was, and he figured it probably wasn’t so nice for Drax either. 

Sometimes he wondered where Jarvis found them all. All those kids that were so weird. Not that he minded. Tony was glad he had friends. Siblings. They helped him learn things about people, which was good for him, Jarvis said. And as much as Tony liked to pretend that he really only needed to build things and be on his own, even he had noticed that he was doing better now that he had people he could help. Although apparently tuning Rhodey’s wheelchair wasn’t the kind of help Jarvis wanted him to provide. 

“You need to drink something,” Bruce said in his quiet voice. He always sounded like his mind was busy with something else and didn’t even notice that his mouth was making sounds. Tony liked it, because it reminded him of himself. 

“I’m not thirsty.” Shrugging, Tony kept his eyes on the fabric in his hands. 

“You need to drink. If you felt thirsty, you’d already be dehydrated.” Bruce held out a bottle for Tony. “It’s not water,” he said, when Tony wouldn’t take it, “I know you don’t like water.”

“It’s bitter. I’ll drink, okay? Just put it down.” Once Bruce had done as asked, Tony picked up the bottle and took a few sips. It tasted lemony, he liked that. “There. Happy?” When Bruce shrugged, Tony felt bad. It wasn’t his fault that Tony had been teamed up with him. “Thanks, Bruce.” He smiled at his friend, and Bruce smiled back, befure they both returned to their sewing. “I’m glad he’s so tiny, otherwise this would take forever,” Tony said and Bruce chuckled, then cursed. 

“Stupid needle!” he yelled and threw his knitting to the floor. Tony was quick to set his own work aside and put both projects out of reach. “Stupid, stupid needle!” He knew that trying to talk Bruce out of his fit would only make it worse, so he only made sure his friend wasn’t hurt too badly and then took a step away. There was nothing around them Bruce could throw unless he got up to grab something, and he usually didn’t move around much when he was angry. Unless someone made him… but most kids only did that once before they learned that Bruce was the wrong person to tease. 

With nothing to really direct his anger at, because Tony kept quiet and out of his way, Bruce calmed down after a while of screaming and hitting the floor. Once it was safe, Tony passed him his own water bottle - this one actually filled with plain water. Avoiding to look at his friend, Bruce nodded his thanks and drank to soothe his throat. 

“You can take a break,” Tony said and Bruce nodded again. “I’ll finish yours. We’re almost done anyway.” And they were; even with Tony working alone both items were finished only twenty minutes later. Time to find the little guy and see if their sewing was going to pay off. 

“Grootie,” Tony sing-songed when they found the boy downstairs in the living room. 

“I am-” Groot started, but Tony waved his hand impatiently and interrupted him. 

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Here, we made you something.” He and Bruce held up their projects. “It’s a cape and a mask. We know you don’t like the stuff you can buy at the shops, and it’s Halloween soon, so…” Tony shrugged. “Wanna try it on?”

Groot nodded excitedly, his eyes lighting up as he waved his hands about in the air. They barely managed to get the costume on him with how much he bounced after seeing that his cape had a double quaver on it. He loved music. 

“How do you like it?” Bruce asked. Next to him, Tony was bouncing almost as much as Groot, proud that the cape and mask fit the little boy. 

“I am fine!” Groot said, twirling and flicking his cape with one hand. “I am fine, I am fine.”

“Yes you are,” Tony agreed and the three boys grinned at each other excitedly. 

**Author's Note:**

> All characters in this fic except for Jarvis are kids, they all have issues with disabilities and/or mental illness.  
> This will be slow to update, because it's a prompt-based fic. 
> 
> If you have any ideas or prompts, feel free to send them to me in the comments or on tumblr at tonystarkstoga!
> 
> Please let me know if I forgot any tags :)


End file.
